Watching the news of the protesters coming to Wellington, and the absurd allegations they are spouting.
The endless criticism from the opposition and the media against the government over any detail of the Covid response that didn’t run 100% to plan for each and every person’s circumstances
Made me think wouldn’t it be nice if the coverage of the actions taken by the government, following in case you forgot the advice of scientific experts dealing with unprecedented circumstances, better reflected the experiences and views of the majority? And maybe, just maybe actually had one or two positive things to say about the way it was handled?
I’m not talking about a slavish media or population blowing smoke up the PM’s butt.
I’m not suggesting mistakes shouldn’t be highlighted, challenged, and improved upon.
I’m not suggesting there aren’t people with genuine grievances as to how the actions taken impacted them.
I’m just saying with the nation’s crayon chewers convention arriving at parliament to accuse the PM of crimes against humanity, with the constant focus on the negative, wouldn’t it be nice if there was actually someone shown in the media saying - “bloody hell didn’t they do a good job, I wish they hadn’t had to take the actions they did, heck I’m sure they wish they hadn’t had to, but I understand why they did, I’m glad they did it, and knowing what we know now I’d want them to do pretty much the same things again.”
Yeah, not much chance of that happening. So instead I thought I would share my memories from a year ago of the opening week of the Auckland lock-down. Even for those of us who backed the government and the scientists there was a feeling of - here we go again, when does this ever end?
I’ve chosen this event as I reckon it was around that time we started to hear more angry voices challenging the whole approach where they had been quite rare in the first 15 months of COVID.
Maybe some of it might seem a bit more familiar to your experience than whatever the flotsam and jetsam that have washed up in Wellington today have to say about the unspecified “crimes against humanity” they believe were undertaken by the government.
Shouldn’t the media at least include the views and experiences of the many people who think the government did a great job? Not only those of people that will complain about anything?
17 August 2021: the day before lock-down.
So level four again – we’ve got this Aotearoa!
Feeling a bit emotional over it this time, it’s the suburb where my folks live, that lovely seaside village – damn I hope everyone is ok.
Also my 50th birthday on Sunday, going to be a quiet one not seeing friends and family. My darling wife Fiona fessed up to what she had planned with my best mate Matt, damn that would have been awesome, hopefully we can do it soon! Oh, and I had no idea.
But more importantly our government is on this (pardon my language), they are on this like a muthafucka! Not like Sydney, oh bad stuff is happening yeah maybe we’ll do something in a couple of weeks – carry on. Not like London, why don’t we just pretend everything is back to normal. They are so on it.
Take care all you lovely people, don’t buy all the toilet paper or flour, enjoy time with your family, we’ll get through this again if we do it right.
18 August 2021: Day 1 of lock-down.
Woke up about 4am thinking right which kid needs to be taken where today and when, then remembered no one was going anywhere and went back to sleep.
We had canned spaghetti and cheese on toast with a bit of red onion for lunch, classic lockdown food. Simple things are good. Our dogs were so happy – all of their people are here!
I watched the 1pm press conference, our PM was amazing yet again – so grateful for the rapid action our government has taken.
Some idiots protested about the lockdown – Boo! The police arrested the main idiots – Yay!
Chilling with good music, the only contention in the house being everyone wants me to turn the heating down, and knowing we have another day of all being home tomorrow.
Love a lock-down.
19 August 2021: Day 2 of lock-down.
Woke to the news that Sean Lock had died, not ashamed to say I wept, such a great comedian.
Managed to find a mask to go to the dairy, big ben pies for lunch – classy! The messed up thing is all the products I bought were cheaper than they would have been at the supermarket!
Yelled out to the neighbour to say Hi while doing the dishes, think I freaked her out as there was no one else in the alley and she didn’t know who was talking to her. Sorry Penny. Your dog was very well behaved with next doors cat, my dogs would not be – it sits atop our fence or on the window sill and drives them crazy – clearly on purpose.
The kids have been doing dance classes on Zoom, Fi has been doing sewing projects – seriously sparkly! All at home, Fi doing sewing projects, normally we get this about two weeks a year – bloody love a lock-down!
Take care you lovely people.
20 August 2021: Day 3 of lock-down.
And damn it started with the news of another great person passing, Sir Michael Cullen – founder of the Superfund, of Kiwisaver, of Working for Families. A kind and tremendously witty man, a true socialist, old school Labour man.
Grant Robertson gave a good speech at the end of the press conference, which seemed very appropriate given he is very much following in his footsteps. I bet Michael was chuffed when Grant starting paying back into the Super fund after National had stopped contributions. Glad Grant gave the speech, our PM is incredibly strong but she was clearly, and understandably, very emotional talking about Michael.
Supermarket queue wasn’t too bad, and they were doing a great job checking people had masks and were scanning in. Weird thing I noticed, and remember from the last lock down, people standing in the middle of the aisle and looking at the shelves for long periods as if they’ve just arrived from another planet and have no idea what these products are – maybe they aren’t the person that usually does the shopping? Not very useful for social distancing, nor are the folks having long chatty conversations on their mobiles in the middle of the aisle.
Apparently Paula Bennett now lives in my suburb, she made a post to the community page about being nice to supermarket workers. Naw she discovered kindness, so authentic, so compassionate. I’m sure the tens of thousands of people whose lives she negatively impacted will be pleased to know.
No football for the boys tomorrow feels a bit stink. Johnny’s birthday – going to be a quiet one, I’m sure he’ll take it in his stride. So proud of that young man, kindhearted, wicked smart, and with a wonderfully biting sense of humour.
Take care everyone – except you Paula Bennett, you’re not fooling anyone - leopards don't change their spots.
21 August 2021: Day 4 of lock-down.
Woke up to family members yelling that the oven had stopped working, another day another death. Crap, lockdown is not the time to be without an oven – the thought of cooking with a microwave for days or weeks was not appealing, and it is hardly BBQ weather. Fortunately it just needed the timer reset and worked fine.
Lots more cases, damn this isn’t going to be over any time soon. NSW have completely lost control, and Victoria is not looking good. Still I reckon by locking down immediately we’ll get it under control here. Meanwhile the leader of the opposition demanded that the PM let businesses know when they can open again – WTF?
Lunch was mid afternoon, we’ve become semi nocturnal, and consisted of cake – Thea made Johnny a lovely birthday cake in the resurrected oven.
Scenes of stupidity in Australia with large scale anti lock-down protests, and a man in Christchurch spat at a security guard for not being allowed to enter a supermarket without a mask. Former National MP Matt King urged followers on his Facebook page to read "a highly informative" anti-vaccination article. What the heck is wrong with some people?
50 tomorrow – so weird to have such a big birthday in lockdown, but lovely to be surrounded by family. Goodness Fi and I have been together for half of those years. A lucky man indeed.
22 August 2021: Day 5 of lock-down.
My darling made me breakfast – vomit. I should clarify omelette is called vomit in our house because when the kids were little they couldn’t say it properly and the name stuck.
Yesterday Aotearoa vaccinated and tested record numbers of people; today Ashley got his first jab – Yay! And some people still complained, the same people that would have seen undertakers very busy if they were in charge – feck off.
Watched the health update, surprisingly few idiotic questions, I guess Tova and Jason Walls had the day off. Had a good chat with my folks, pleased to inform that they have secured supplies of Drambuie and Shortbread. Then I had some red wine, some dark peppermint chocolate and read David Slack’s most excellent column from this morning and felt very content.
It won’t be so long before we can see dear family and friends, much to be grateful for. The glass is definitely half… oh hang on, hold that thought… full.
Thank you for all of the kind messages today.
23 August 2021: Day 6 of lock-down.
During the press conference this afternoon Ashley Bloomfield mentioned an IT system that I wrote code on 25 years ago! Man I thought I felt old yesterday – can’t believe they are still using it.
Went to the wine store, no queue at all - none! I remember first lock down the queue was around the block. Maybe we've all calmed down a bit. The supermarket queue wasn't bad, only about 10 minutes - and they even had a bit of meat. Looks like someone bought up all the crisps though. Everyone wearing masks, scanning in, observing social distancing - good work people.
Got a call from one of oldest friends Dave, we would have been in Rotorua together this last weekend. How long have I known Dave? Let me put it this way he was the Dungeon Master when we played D&D – you have no idea how cool we were.
Shared a nice memory of when we used to play golf on the goat track in Rotorua, some of you will know it down by Sulphur Point out the back of the museum. A six pack or two in the bag of clubs, which my son Alex would ride on as a toddler as we went around the course and then Alex would have a good go when we got close to a green with the putter – as Dave said, he could hit it further than us! I recall spending a lot of time looking for balls in the bushes, we always seemed to find more balls than we hit in there.
Good day all in all – stay safe and well you lovely people. Oh, and do watch The Panthers from last night if you haven't - best local production since Outrageous Fortune/Westside, really liking the soundtrack too.
24 August 2021: Day 7 of lock-down.
Not a lot to report on the home front. A very quiet day, no one left the house, heck the kids hardly came out of their rooms. Matty made chicken nuggets for lunch pretty much the only “meat” available at the supermarket, so we had samosas from some recent fundraiser for dinner – ahh the lock down health kick.
Watching the 1pm health update with Grant Robertson I was struck by a terrible thought – imagine a parallel universe where it was Steven Joyce or Paul Goldsmith or David Seymour up there instead – ugh perish the thought. I’m glad that Jacinda got a break from the baying media pack – Jason Walls was especially moronic today.
The Paralympics start tonight, excited to see Sophie Pascoe add to her medal tally – what an athlete! Listening to Thea take an online tap class, it is like sporadic bursts of machine gun fire – RIP the wooden floor. She is the Taperina!
Scott Morrison declared our elimination strategy was like living in a cave, naw it is nice that he has finally taken an interest in Covid. To be honest Scott from marketing can go and perform an act with him self which is really anatomically quite improbable.
Everyone else though take care – not you Jason Walls.
So what do you remember, what will you remember, about what this time was like and whether the government did a good job or should actually be tried for crimes against humanity?
What should be written about it?
Thank you Nick for your look back at those days. As an old gal I am grateful for the steps our leaders took to keep us safe. Who knows how many lives could have been lost without the lockdown- many people even enjoyed the 'time out. And here we all are, getting on with it. Hooray for us, boo to the moaners and whingers.
Really enjoy your writing Nick. We, in our house, are very happy with Jacinda and her team and Ashley and his team. What an amazing job they did tackling the unknown on a daily basis, and without a script to follow. I'm sure this enabled lots more people to still be around who just might not have been if "the knockers"had been listened to after every slight hiccup.